By Octavio Ruiz and Mackie Grady Posted: December 20, 2019
Sarah Fernandez is from a small town but the support of her family has helped her set big goals.
Without the great support of her family, she wouldn’t be pursuing her acting career because she would have struggled with believing in herself.
“Definitely not, my parents and I actually had a conversation about something like this and just the support of everybody like my parents, Mrs. [Corrine] James, and the drama class,” said Fernandez. “Knowing myself I would’ve overthought everything and think I wasn’t good enough to do this but my mom was saying there are so many people that had these problems and thought they couldn’t do it. So my mom is always pushing me to be the best I can and never give up, same with the rest of my friends, they’re all supporting me through it all and it’s really nice.”
This support has helped her to be a better performer.
“My family is just always there for me, rooting for me you know telling me how I can improve and get better but also you know saying that I am able to do great things and they’ve never left my side,” said Fernandez.
Sarah is planning on moving to Los Angeles, which obviously is different from Winnemucca, and can be a frightening experience and she knows it won’t be easy.
“I’m probably going to start in the foodservice industry,” said Fernandez. “I’m going to try to audition for movie roles but when I move if another opportunity comes then I’ll do that but acting is the big thing. LA is a scary place there’s a lot of crime…and I’m moving without a set plan.”
Sarah is going to do whatever roles she can get, she’s trying to make her way up but if she can get a big role in a movie she’s going to take advantage of it because that’s her goal in the end.
“I’ll go for you know whatever I can if I end up getting a lead part for a movie that’s fantastic and totally mind-blowing but I’ll most likely do smaller parts and stuff so I can just build my way up, but that would be amazing,” said Fernandez. “You go into an audition and you just wow the casting director and you just totally score because I eventually want to become a pretty big part in a movie so having that as one of the first gigs that I get would just be crazy, so I mostly just plan on starting out as small parts but we’ll see.”
Sarah is striving for movie roles that she enjoys.
“ I just would like to pick out a movie role that I would enjoy, something I would really like to be a part of instead of just getting the quickest or easiest role to get the most money,” said Fernandez. “So to do that I’ll go over the scripts of course to see if it’s something I’m passionate about and really want to invest my time in.”
Although religion is an important aspect of Sarah’s life, it won’t get in the way of her planned career.
“I’m not going to let it stop me, you know the religion part stop me from you know, going into this great role or something like that just because of this one part,” said Fernandez.
Sarah doesn’t have a huge problem remembering her lines because of her good memory but she second guesses herself sometimes.
“Well, I personally don’t have a lot of problem memorizing lines I think I have a pretty good memory but I know that it is hard for a lot of people and it does get pretty stressful especially even if I know my lines right before I have to go on I can just second guess myself,” said Fernandez.
Missoula Children’s Theater was an influential program that got Sarah into acting when she was younger. The high school drama program gave her a chance to improve her passion and she doesn’t let her shy personality get in the way.
“Well I’ve been acting since I was really young, we did this Missoula Children’s Theater,” said Fernandez. “So then I got into high school drama and you know since I was little I’ve been watching the plays go on at the high school I’ve just always wanted to be part of that. And I like expressing myself on a stage, it’s weird because I get really nervous presenting in front of classes and stuff but then when I get on stage it’s just like a totally different feeling, I just love it.”
Sarah doesn’t let her shy personality get in the way of performing but her having great classmates inspires her.
“Partially, for the past two years I’ve had a pretty great family as my drama class and they make the class really fun and they put their own spin on things and of course their characters and that just makes me want to do more and be better,” said Fernandez.
James is both Sarah’s teacher and role model because James has so much passion and love for what she does like making sure everything is perfect which eventually led to Sarah seeing herself in James.
“Ever since I’ve known her [James] when I was little she has just been such a light and I’ve just always looked up to her and she knows how to put on plays, she knows the perfect parts for each role that she casts,” said Fernandez. “She just has so much passion for this I can see that and it just shows every day throughout her work.”
Sarah doesn’t believe Hollywood will change her in a negative way, she knows that the industry can be corrupt but she knows that she will only be stronger no matter happens because of the great support of her family and friends.
“I hope I don’t change, I don’t think I ever would but I know the world and industry can be kind of corrupt and it can be challenging but I don’t think it will change me in a bad way,” said Fernandez. “If it does it will make me stronger just because I know when I go it’s going to be really hard. But I think having the family that I do and their support and having communications with them, they’re going to keep me grounded and help me out and keep me the way I am.”
Sarah is scared that her acting dream might not come true or that she isn’t made to do it even though she put all this time and effort into something that wasn’t for her.
“The fact that acting might not be my thing. You know I’ll go and try and I’ll end up failing or maybe it’s something I’m not made to do,” said Fernandez. “I guess just putting all the time and money and just all this effort into something that might not be for me even though it’s what I’ve dreamed of my whole life. There’s always that ‘what if’, what if it doesn’t work out.”
Sarah knows that accomplishing her dreams isn’t impossible but knows it’s going to take a lot of time and effort. She’s already preparing herself to make sure she knows what to do and how to not let negativity get in the way.
“It takes some skills, and you have to work really hard for what you want as it’s really hard to get into acting and still work hard and go to auditions you know all the time or whenever you can,” said Fernandez. “Acting probably isn’t as hard as trying to get into medical school but I don’t think as many people realize acting is hard. I’ve been reading a lot and trying to figure out everything that I need to know as I go down there. I know it’ll be hard but I don’t really think about the negative stuff.”
Araceli Galarza contributed to this story.
